


Culture Shock

by bmouse



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, KagaKuro Week, M/M, Oh Japan, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-06
Updated: 2015-10-06
Packaged: 2018-04-25 02:58:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4944115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bmouse/pseuds/bmouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before they can start on their journey to defeat the Generation of Miracles there's the small matter of... paperwork. Japan apparently handles the whole A/B/O thing a little differently than Kagami is used to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Culture Shock

Don’t ask him how, but that weird Kuroko guy from last night found him before class. It was still fucking eerie - one second it was just him yawning his way through an alley trying to get to school early and the next it was the two of them, like he’d melted out of the wall. 

"Good morning" he said in that blank, prim way of his "Sorry to startle you." 

Kagami blinked blearily at him, it was too early to be startled. 

"I may have forgotten one thing last night." 

Reaching into his backpack he pulled out a white sheet of paper. 

Kagami waved it away. "’Filled out the club membership form yesterday." 

"This isn't that. I'm afraid I to make our goal possible I must ask Kagami-kun for a favor." Kagami squinted at the form, it had the school seal and like four paragraphs of explanation at the top, all with a shitton of kanji. It was too fucking early for kanji. 

"OK, so what’s this one for then?" 

"I need someone to be my designated Extracurriculars Assistance Partner. I'm afraid they don't let people like me participate in physically intense club activities without one." 

"Uhmm, what? But you're a..." 

Kuroko was an Alpha, clearly. That’s why Kagami had felt that weird zing under his skin from the second he met the guy. Sure he was the coldest-running one Kagami had seen in basically ever but cold-Alphas had their own mythos. There was a reason Clint Eastwood flicks were popular. Anyway, his dynamic was obvious, from the little 'come the fuck at me' tilt of his chin to that still-water self-possessed loner thing he had going on. 

Except he was looking at Kagami like he could read all his thoughts on a teleprompter and minutely shaking his head.

"You’re a Beta?" 

Kuroko's mouth flattened out. 

"Worse, I'm afraid. A Beta would require no extra paperwork." And that’s how Kagami found himself struck dumb for like the fifth time in a row since meeting the guy. 

"Seriously?! You're a... _Holy shit!_ " 

Kuroko let him have a couple seconds to process, not saying anything just keeping up as they walked. It was a little shitty of him but Kagami couldn’t help eyeing him up and down in light of this new information. Not that it cleared anything up. There was seriously nothing Omega-like about him. Maybe his small hands? Was that a thing? They weren’t even really small so much as proportionate. Omegas were also supposed to be soothing, to radiate warmth and comfort and stuff like that. Kuroko was like a tiny walking glacier. Guess that served him right for buying into the stereotypes. 

“I mean, what would I have to do? Follow you around? Fight people off?”

"It’s not nearly as medieval as Kagami-kun seems to think. Mostly things like sitting together, getting notes in the rare instances I am incapacitated, reminding me to apply neutralizer after practices. Mostly having an Alpha nearby is said to cause a beneficial symbiotic stabilization effect. For both parties."

Oh Japan. Sure it sounded reasonable on paper, but it was pairing people up into some kind of proto-Bond any way you sliced it. Only the Japanese Educational System would think of doing a fake school-marriage thing as a way to make sure people paid attention in class. 

"So America really has no such system?" Kuroko wondered aloud.

"Well no. They just hand out suppressants by the handful for those who want ‘em and otherwise people kind of sort themselves out." 

"That seems very… individualistic." Kuroko’s tone was so deliberately neutral it hurt. Kagami snorted. That was the way people here talked to you when they thought you were nuts. 

"Oh yeah? Well we don’t assign people _handlers_ like they’re a bomb or something, that's pretty goddamn weird."

He glanced down at Kuroko and for once the expression on the guy’s face was the farthest thing from unreadable. Everything from the set of his mouth to the narrow look in those creepy pale eyes said _'Humor me, man. I can't believe I have to deal with this bullshit either’_ and Kagami, who was honestly still at sea about so much of the cultural stuff since coming back, felt a sharp pang of kinship.

"OK, fine. I’ll do it. We'll be on the same team so we're going to be around each other anyway. We have the same homeroom, right?”

“Yes. I also thought that would be be convenient." 

“Allright, where do I sign?” Kuroko produced a pen out of his sleeve like some kind of magician and, lacking any flat surface, gave a minute shrug and let Kagami fill the form out using his back.

That brought on a sudden flood of memories; elementary school, horsing around with people back in LA. Kagami felt a weird sense of OK-ness about it. Everyone here had a mile-wide personal bubble unless you were sardine-d into a commuter train; the whole country badly needed to unclench. This, and their lame-ass one-on-one game yesterday was the closest he’d been to another person in a depressingly long time. 

Kagami had a bad thought. Standing up close behind Kuroko like, did this look weird? Was he maybe not supposed to touch him since their dynamics matched up? But then he thought ‘fuck it’, this whole setup basically guaranteed him someone to hang out with and pathetic as it was, he could use it. It was like the form said, a symbiotic relationship. No need to second guess it. He mentally rolled that whole line of thought up into a ball and dunked it into the garbage. 

Then he had another bad thought.

“Wait. _Wait._ What happens if you get a spike? Does that mean I have to…” 

Kuroko cough-laughed into his fist.

"That was really a question Kagami-kun should have asked _before_ signing but, no. This carries absolutely no physical obligation. Most people confine themselves to escorting their partner to the nurse’s office and standing outside the door. Also, I am thankfully not at all prone to those sorts of incidents."

Man, the guy’s blood must be mostly ice water and vanilla shakes. He was looking him straight in the eye talking about that stuff and there wasn’t even a hint of pink anywhere. From bitter experience Kagami knew that the itching he felt in his cheeks and all the way up his neck meant his face was so warm someone could fry up _omurice_ on his ears.

"Oh. That’s… good.'" he managed lamely. Yeah the whole Omega thing was still a shock but it was even weirder to imagine Kuroko with any kind of sex drive. _That_ just did not compute. But the guy clearly had balls, to just lay it all out there and he figured he owed him a little reciprocity. 

"I don't have spikes either. Never really had them, actually. All my my energy just goes into other things, you know?" 

That got him a small blink of recognition. "Kagami-kun is very sensible, despite his appearance." 

"Hey! Is that any way to speak to your designated-extracurricular-whatever partner?" 

"I suppose not, I do apologize." Kuroko said, in a way that meant he wasn't sorry at all, the bastard, and then the school gates were in sight and it was too late to put him in a headlock.

In the end it wasn’t even that weird. Kagami handed the homeroom teacher their application, she glanced at it, looked between them and only said that it was a good thing she wouldn’t have to change their seating arrangements since they were already next to each other. Volunteering for Designated Extracurricular Assistance Partner apparently also gave Kagami an extra ‘civic service’ credit. Which, judging by how lost he was in half the classes, he was pretty sure he was gonna need. 

And there was another bonus. 

“Psst, hey.” he whispered, poking Kuroko with a finger as the guy was taking shameless advantage of his evil invisibility powers to nap through a history lecture. “Is this going to put a damper on that note-in-the-shoebox confession crap? Since we’re pretty much joined at the hip?”

With what looked like a ton of effort, Kuroko cracked open his left eye. "It will provide a considerable obstacle." he said.

"Good. Obstacle away. It’s super fucking awkward and who’s got time for that? We’ve got a bunch of strong guys to beat."

Kuroko nodded solemnly and blinked his eye shut but then later in the day he gave Kagami a warning kick in the shin when the teacher was coming by and he was spacing out. He wasn’t a bad guy really, that Kuroko, and at least he liked basketball. 

Out of nowhere, Kagami had the sudden urge to put his hands behind his head and kick up his feet. 

 

~

**Author's Note:**

> Haha it just figures that I'd use a trope popularized by porn for weird world building instead. I did manage to make a universe where 'we had to get quasi-married before they let us play sports' is a thing though. hehe (ര̀ᴗര́)و ̑̑ I might make it a series...


End file.
